Lance's Week 14 Predictions

Every week I’ll be putting out my predictions, they will include my winner for each game with a brief explanation, and 1 start and 1 sit for each fantasy football position. As usual, I’ll start with my picks:

Overall Record: 123-68-1

LA Rams over New England

The Pats looked great last week, but I really think they were just taking advantage of a rookie QB. The Rams are the best team in the NFC West and may be the second best team in the NFC overall. Their defense is one of the best in the league especially against the pass, Goff is playing well and their run game is finally starting to find itself.

Tampa Bay over Minnesota

As a Vikings fan (knowing where they’re at in the playoff race) I really really hope I’m wrong about this, but on paper the Bucs should win. Minnesota’s pass defense is horrid, they almost allowed Mike Glennon to knock them off. Brady and his plethora of pass catchers should have their way in this one.

Arizona over NY Giants

Can the Giants work their magic again? As a Vikings fan I certainly hope so! As an unbiased observer, no I don’t think they can. The Cards have certainly come back down to Earth, but Murray’s dual threat ability will keep the Giants defense on their toes.

Miami over Kansas City

Stay with me here, cause it’s a bumpy idea road, but I think it makes sense. The Chiefs have won each of their last four games by six points or less. That includes games against Carolina, Vegas and Denver. Miami’s defense is tied for the least amount of passing touchdowns allowed, and is top ten in sacks. The Chiefs defense, on the other hand, is middle of the pack against the pass and bottom ten against the run. Plus, as you’ll see below, the unit has been less than impressive over their last 5 games. Miami pulls out a low-scoring nailbiter.

Tennessee over Jacksonville

The Jags have looked pretty good with Glennon under Center, but this week they’re gonna have to deal with an angry Titans team that’s going to run and throw all over their non-existent defense.

Dallas over Cincinnati

I’m taking Dalton in his revenge game.

Houston over Chicago

Another revenge game, sort of, this is the first time Watson will get to face the team that passed on him at pick 2 and if everything continues on the path it’s been going he’ll be facing the guy they chose instead.

Carolina over Denver

Both of these teams are tough to figure out. They’re playing a lot better than I expected (Carolina as a whole, Denver since Miller and Sutton went down for the season). But they’re also bad enough to end up picking in the top ten. I flipped a coin, it really could go either way.

Seattle over NY Jets

Don’t expect to see the Jets stick around in this one, and don’t expect to see the same deflated Seahawks that have shown up over the last few weeks. This is the game where Wilson gets his mojo back.

Indianapolis over Las Vegas

The Raiders are too sporadic to trust in games against the better teams in the league. Rivers takes advantage of a poor pass defense, and Indy’s defense shuts down the potentially Jacob-less Raiders.

Washington over San Francisco

Washington has a legit chance at taking over the NFC East this week. Alex Smith is playing better and their D-Line continues to wreak havoc on opposing gameplans. In case you didn’t know, they are currently tied for 3rd in sacks this season.

New Orleans over Philadelphia

Hurts could give Philly’s offense the spark they need. But there’s not enough for us to go off of in that area and unless Philly’s QB play improves drastically this week they will not beat the Saints.

LA Chargers over Atlanta

I was on the fence about this game, ultimately choosing the Chargers because I think Bosa takes advantage of an O-Line that let the Saints destroy their backfield twice in the last three weeks.

Green Bay over Detroit

Detroit won the week after their coach was fired, which really isn’t a surprise, the Falcons and Texans did the same thing the week after they fired their Head Coaches. The bigger surprise was seeing Stafford throw for over 400 yards for the first time this season (and over 300 for just the third time this season). Green Bay is a much tougher out for them. With division rivalries anything is possible, but let’s be realistic people.

Pittsburgh over Buffalo

Buffalo’s defense has been nowhere near the unit that’s carried the Bills over the last couple seasons, so Big Ben and his Receivers should be able to move the ball and put up points. On the other side of that Allen has finished under a 90 QBR in 5 games this season. Those games were losses to the Titans and Chiefs, a small margin loss to the Cardinals, and small margin wins against the Chargers and Patriots. The Steelers defense is way better than all five of those teams. And as of right now the Titans, Chiefs and Cardinals are the only playoff teams from that group (the Cards are technically just on the outside looking in, but I don’t know what the tie breaker is that has the Vikings in front of them).

Cleveland over Baltimore

There’s a light years difference between where these two teams are now in comparison to where they were at in their week 1 matchup. The Browns are on a four game win streak and Baker hasn’t thrown a pick in his last five games. The Chubb/Hunt duo is dominating on the ground and their pass rush has been fierce with Garrett on the field. The Ravens are on the outside of the playoff race looking in. They’ve lost four out of their last six, Jackson has thrown four picks in all three of the losses he was a part of (from those four I mentioned), and their offense just looks lost.

Fantasy Starts and Sits

Record for QBs, TEs, Ks, and Ds is based off if they finished top 12 or not

Record for RBs and WRs is based off if they finished top 24 or not.

QB Record: 12-14

QB Start: Justin Herbert vs Atlanta

It’s a get right game for the rookie. He got thrashed by the Patriots, but that’s what Belichick does, he destroys rookie QBs until they’re nothing but a pile of ash. This week he gets the Falcons who sporadically play very good defense, but more times than not they’re allowing 20+ to opposing Quarterbacks.

QB Sit: Taysom Hill at Philadelphia

He’s had two good games, but both were against the Falcons and he’s only played three games total. Philly will present trouble for Hill in the form of a top ten pass defense.

RB Record: 11-15

RB Start: Melvin Gordon at Carolina

He’s coming off his best rushing yards performance in a Broncos jersey and now he gets a shot at a run defense that allows 4.6 YPC and has given up 14 touchdowns on the ground. If the Broncos commit to the “hot hand” then Gordon will be an even more valuable fantasy back.

RB Sit: Miles Sanders vs New Orleans

Look, if Sanders can’t get it going against the Packers, there’s no way he’s going to be helpful against the Saints who have only allowed 5 rushing touchdowns and they’re giving up about 76 rush yards per game.

WR Record: 12-14

WR Start: Jamison Crowder at Seattle

Mims will not play Sunday, so Crowder is my new start and if he can’t go then Perriman is my start. And that is all for the same reason, the Seahawks should be able to run up the score, forcing the Jets into pass mode early. And Seattle’s allowing the most yards passing per game (about 323) and they’ve given up 21 touchdowns through the air.

WR Sit: Brandon Aiyuk vs Washington

He’s scored in three consecutive starts, but I’m gonna say this is where that streak stops. Washington is only allowing 10.6 YPR and averages 1.5 passing touchdowns per game. They did a great job of shutting down Chase Claypool this past week who, like Aiyuk, is more of a traditional outside Receiver.

TE Record: 15-11

TE Start: Jordan Akins at Chicago

How about a deep dive option for a position that most may be hurting at right now? With Fuller out a lot of people thought Akins should see an uptick, but he didn’t. I can explain that one, he was going against Indy who is one of the top defenses against the Tight End this season. Chicago is one of the worst. In the last three weeks they’ve allowed three Tight Ends to post 60+ yards against them and two weeks ago they allowed two of Green Bay’s Tight Ends to score. Akins is a sneaky option if you’re desperate.

TE Sit: Darren Waller vs Indianapolis

Speaking of Indy, they have to deal with Waller this week who is coming off one of the greatest single-game performances by a Tight End ever. I expect him to come plummeting back to earth against the Colts who allow an average of 37 yards to Tight Ends a week and have only given up one touchdown through the air to the position this season.

K Record: 13-13

K Start: Ryan Succop vs Minnesota

A good formula for determining if a Kicker has a good matchup is to look at how many Field Goals the opposing team typically allows in the 20-49 yard range. That’s the range that shows they have the ability to keep the opposing team out of the end zone, but they’re also not that good at preventing a team from moving the ball on them. The Vikings have allowed 21 Field Goals in that range. Other’s have allowed more, but 21 is a solid number.

K Sit: Matt Prater vs Green Bay

The Kickers you generally want to avoid are the ones that play on teams that you could see falling way behind early and having to forgo Field Goals (and possibly extra points) just to try and play keep-up. Detroit is that team for me this week.

Defense Record: 19-7

Defense Start: Tampa Bay Buccaneers vs Minnesota

Outside of Seattle, a lot of the defensive matchups aren’t all that favorable this week. The favorable opponents are facing defenses that aren’t that good, which makes it difficult to see them posting good fantasy numbers. So I’m going with Tampa. The Vikings have the offense to light up the scoreboard, but they’ve also turned the ball over a bit this season and Todd Bowles loves turnovers (14 interceptions and 2 fumble recoveries this year).

Defense Sit: Kansas City Chiefs at Miami

Say what you will about Tua Tagovailoa, the man hasn’t thrown an interception yet. He was also very good in that respect when he was at Alabama. K.C.’s defense hasn’t hit double-digit fantasy points since week 7. The stretch since then has included games with the Jets, Panthers, Raiders and Broncos. If they haven’t been able to dominate those teams from a fantasy perspective, then they’re going to struggle against Miami.